While Andretti's comments were motor racing-related they conversely were relevant to road car technology.

Sitting in the lagoon restaurant of the Marriott Hotel at Surfers Paradise, Andretti was having a good old natter about whether driving skill has been taken away in this age of electronic overload.

I look at the computer as a tool and I've said it a thousand times, a tool to advance your knowledge.

The 1978 F1 world champion qualified his opinion by saying a computer does not do the work for you it gives you information.

But you have to ask the computer what you want to know therefore it's not a substitute for what you know.

That conversation was recalled when a letter to the editor in an issue of Forbes magazine in March appeared where a reader proclaimed his horror at electronic advances in cars.

He wrote: Allowing software unfettered control of our automobiles removes one of our chief assets; human decision making.

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